Bows for Thistles
by Mechalich
Summary: Exalted: the Mask of Winters needs the Island of Thistles to feed his army. Abandoned by the Realm, can a tiny handful of disparate dragon-blooded and struggling mortals find the strength to fight such an overpowering enemy?
1. Chapter 1

**Bows for Thistles**

"To pull a thistle wounds the hand. A broken thistle grows back stronger than before." - Practical Management of the Thousand and One Weeds

**Chapter 1**

**4 Descending Water**

**RY 769**

The clouds darkened high in the sky above the _Blue Tern_, portending a blow to come, a grim countenance to match the mood of at least one of the watchers. When it started raining a few minutes later the cold drops brought a brief smile to his face.

Harborhead awaits, and then they'll be little enough rain at that, Rafan thought with limited interest. His mind was rarely on his next duty, for it brought him no pleasure to think on it, and required only a tiny portion of his attention to fulfill at this stage. Duty was a generous description in any case. He was being disciplined, severely, and knew it perfectly.

Damn it all anyway, he groused, watching as the waves picked up. Wind from the south, odd, but no matter. He was stuck on this small, old vessel with a mere scale of soldiers, sent halfway across the South on a fool's errand to muster new levies. All so some idiot dynasts could throw them away as a monument to their own hubris.

Spurred by his dark thoughts to action, but stymied by the confines of the ship, Rafan began pacing back and forth across the foredeck, heedless of the spray and rain. No one bothered him, the sailors were busy, and the soldiers had known his mood was worsening the whole voyage, and stayed away when they could. He was past being bothered by this, the voyage had worn down the courtesies between them all, as extended travel inevitably did, and it would be let go when matters were done.

_Blue Tern_ rocked suddenly in the middle of his brooding, and a massive blast of spray took flesh from moist to soaked in an instant. Shaking his head against the brine, the soldier turned to observe the sea had changed with unseemly swiftness.

Clouds black as pitch whirled above, and furious wind roared from the south, lashing the seas to fury. The storm was rising all about the little ship, creaking in pain already, anticipating the blows to come.

Crushed down a sudden wrench of shame at his failure to remain alert, Rafan vaulted down from foredeck to the main, where soldiers scrambled. "Captain!" he shouted, putting lungs taught on the battlefield to use against the storm.

The fair-haired westerner who was master of the ship acknowledged with a hurried wave from a position behind _Blue Tern_'s single mast. He stood beside a veteran mariner at the tiller, shouting commands to his sailors.

Winds hollowed, and the vessel ran before them, so it was into the teeth of the rain that Rafan strode to meet the sailor, but he brushed aside the brine, ignoring it. He'd strode forward through arrow clouds and howling blasts of firedust artillery. This was not going to intimidate him.

"What comes captain?" Rafan questioned, as gently as he could when forced to shout above the elements.

"Elementals must be fighting, this is as demonic a blow as I've ever seen!" the sailor shouted back. "Can't hold to Harborhead my lord, have to let the wind carry us, the ship's not got the strength for more!"

"So be it," Rafan grunted, and saw open gratitude spread over the captain's face. Clearly the man had expected his passenger to attempt to overrule the order. Always trust the advice of a master in crafts one does not know, it had been a lesson from his first true teacher, and one the soldier had not forgotten in the years since. "What can my men do?" He was no sailor, but surely twenty-five disciplined sets of hands could be put to some use.

"Man the pumps below," the captain answered without a flicker of hesitation. "I'll need every trained man on deck."

"Sergeant Major!" Rafan called to the senior of his fang commanders. "All men below, work the pumps in shifts!"

The wind almost stole the words from his mouth, and he bellowed them a second time just to be sure, only content when the man saluted with a fist to the chest and started motioning to those few troops still on deck. Turning back to the captain, Rafan asked another question. "And myself?"

"Have you charms to avert this tempest?" the captain questioned, and looked disappointed when Rafan shook his head. The soldier had never served in the navy, and had not talents there. "Then watch the rails for spirits, surely some elemental rides with this storm, and we'd best be ready." Turning away at this admonition, the captain then turned back a moment later. "Watch the tiller too," he said, unexpectedly laying a hand on the soldier's wrist. "If we lack the strength to hold it, you must. Save the ship at least."

They were dark words, enough so that the touch went unremarked in Rafan's mind. The captain worries we will not survive. A terrible thing to hear. So he descended to the maindeck, letting the spray wash over him, and drew his bow. The green jade artifact glistened in the spray, but was in no way weakened by wetness. He notched an arrow and waited. Surely something would appear.

In time, as the blackness surrounded them and the ship rode the waves with crashing speed and power, the captain's prediction came true. Rafan knew the names and shapes of some spirits and elementals, but whatever this creature was he had no time to say. It was fish-like, in a sense, but had the snout of a wolf and jumped the rail to land on stout legs.

Then it flew back into the sea with a barbed broadhead shaft buried in its chest.

"Anyone else?" Rafan called the challenge to the watching spirits, wondering if there was a swarm waiting beyond the flashes of bright lightning that now blasted vision every handful of heartbeats.

None rose to the bait. The other elementals, it seemed, were content to let the storm bring the prize to them.

The mighty tempest looked unlikely to make them wait long.

From crest to trough _Blue Tern_ slammed with each massive blast of water. Wood creaked and splintered, and the shock of each strike sent waves of force through Rafan's body. Sailors, awash in brine to their knees, where thrown to the deck again and again, but they soldiered on, exhorted by their captain's calls and the certainty that should they fail to keep running beyond the storm it would swallow them whole and leave nothing left.

Every man on the deck was tied in place by a stout line save Rafan. This was not a demonstration of strength on his part, no wooden deck would thrown him, not with the blood of Sextes Jylis in his veins, but even his steady demeanor blanched now as the walls of water rose high all about them. The furry of storm was not the furry of battle, it was majestic, not anarchic, and fully natural, the creation of gods unbound by the meddling of men, but it was no less terrible for this.

Dragons have mercy on us, he prayed silently in a moment of weakness.

Then lightning struck the mast.

The great pine, harvested in the far forests of Linowan over a century past and having traveled all the seas of creation in long service since, snapped at the power of the sky, cracking and breaking. The wind grasped the spars in the next moment, tearing them free. Unbalanced, Blue Tern lurched in the heaving spray, and doom descended around them.

"Dragon-blood!" the captain's hoarse cry echoed in the whirling fury of sea and sky struggling to merge in their wrath. "The tiller!"

Rafan's head snapped around to watch two stout sailors flung from the tiller and thrown back. One flew over the rail, gone for certain.

Striding against the wind, the soldier bound his bow to his back and ran for the loose column. He knew little of sailing, but he knew they must keep the waves before them or see the ship crushed. If he could just get there in time...

A mighty wave slammed the side of the ship, throwing men to the rails, or over. Rafan felt the blow course through the planking and knew he must act now. He let some of his power free, essence coursing down limbs, giving him strength and speed of limb in a manner no ordinary mortal could match.

His feet shifted with the strike of the waves, and he careened into the air, landing boot first and parallel to the decking against the struck mainmast. Then he jumped with all his strength, spinning through the air to grasp the tiller from above, grunting in exertion as it slammed him down and blasted the air from his lungs when he connected with the deck.

"Turn, damn it! Turn!" Rafan was a strong man, a soldier's life had seen to that, and he let loose more of his power to gain a moment of inhuman strength, but it was not strength to match the ocean, and in her rage her could not fight back alone. The tiller held steady, but it would not turn.

Waves rose on both sides, and then plummeted down, twin landslides with power greater than an army's blow.

Is this my fate then? Rafan thought as his eyes rose in his head to see the descending doom. To die in a storm, far from my troops, my duties, my purpose?

He knew a moment of despair.

The mountain of black-blown liquid torment landed.

Planks cracked, decks caved, and the _Blue Tern_ gave her death cry in the tear of iron bracing.

Rafan sucked in a last blast of air and was hurled into the sea.

He plunged into the frigid water of the stormy ocean, chaos in the darkness.

Is this death then? Rafan wondered as he saw lightning illuminate the space below, filled with shards of ship and bodies. Am I to sink to the bottom, a lost soul to become nothing but a pretty piece of green jade for the fish to gawk at in the darkness below?

That armor belongs to the Realm soldier! The voice belonged to a nameless sergeant, a man who trained raw recruits at the Stair. The armor and the weapons too, and you'll bring them back better than you found them, or you'll be begging for a fate as easy as death!

Rafan's eyes snapped open. Maybe it is my fate to die today, but I will not loose what was entrusted to me! That is worth more than this life!

He kicked and thrashed then, letting loose as much essence as he could to bring his strength as far as it would go.

Lungs burned like a forge fire, but he broke the surface long enough to fill them before the waves washed over him in torrent again.

Dark though the sea was, there were darker shadows above. Planks! Rafan realized. Wood would float. He needed to find a piece to grasp.

On his third surge to the surface, green burs of verdant potency bursting to life around him from the exertion of his power, Rafan grabbed the piece he sought. He had time enough to notice, in bitter irony, that he clung to life on the fragments of the tiller itself.

Then there was time for naught but survival.

Dawn came upon an exhausted and semi-conscious soldier, adrift in the Inland Sea on the fractured steering column of a ship the depths had determined it was time to reclaim. Looking east to the rise of the daystar, he saw a shadow through salt-scourged eyes. A great shape rose in the distance.

A mighty peak, his tired mind reasoned.

Half a minute later it managed the connection.

A mountain...land!

The thought invigorated his wretched muscles, and he began to kick and push, hoping desperately to reach that promise of salvation, unbelievable though it seemed.

How long it took Rafan did not know, struggling there in the suddenly placid and serene sea.. His mind was burned and blurred, and he knew only to kick on and on, struggling for the shoreline, for the one thing that might save him.

In fits and starts, fighting exhaustion and the fetid desire to give up the fight as futile, he progressed, and as the sun fell behind him his ragged kicks failed one last time and sank to the depths his arm-hold on the log would permit.

Only to strike sand.

Half-blind and without conscious thought this contact spurred one last surge of energy, and Rafan charged forward, plowing halfway up the rocky beach, cutting his feet many times and ignoring the stinging pain until he collapsed in the shade of a tree there.

It was then, unable to muster the strength to move, looking out to the sun far beyond, that the soldier managed a grim laugh.

Sent away I was, and now I am! But I live! Others had died, surely the storm had been meant to claim them all, their fate come to an abrupt end, as it often did at sea. I live! He crowed. But why? Twenty-five good men of the Legions, and another nine sailors, all lost, surely, and only he survived. The blood of the dragons doubtless had much to do with it, but why had he lived on?

Rafan had brushed against death many times, but always in battle, never had he faced Heaven's wrath in this way. There must be some meaning to it, but what? He could see no answer, and as exhaustion took him he could only think on the events that had set him on this course. The memories rose up even as focus vanished.


	2. Chapter 2

**Chapter 2**

**21 Ascending Water**

**RY 769**

"Pass the order," Rafan called down the line to his subordinate officers. "When they attempt to circle the High Blades we run to the creek and bury them in a storm of arrows."

There were quick nods of assent, it was all going to plan. The rebels, knowing they had to win here or be destroyed when the rest of the Twelfth arrived in two days, had taken the bait. The main body of their assault, unwilling to face the heavy armor of the High Blades, was circling to meet a weaker line to the right, never realizing that Rafan had a full dragon of archers below the slope ready to shoot them from the other side of the creek and the high ground.

Suddenly a youth, one of those teenage southern boys who served as a Legion runner, charged up to the dispersing officers. "Dragonlord!" he gasped, wheezing and gulping for breath.

Rafan knew bad when he saw it, and a runner that tired was almost always bad. It was something anyone who'd spent time in the Legions simply understood instinctively. "Here!" he acknowledged. "Spit it out boy, what's happened?" There was no time for courtesy.

"Wing...lord," the boy struggled to say the words. "Winglord Deshral, has withdrawn."

"What?" Rafan thundered, and he spun, eyes gazing to the knobby hill behind his force, the hill Deshral's infantry was supposed to be occupying. He saw no force of troops in matching legion army in battle lines, only brown-cloaked rebel skirmishers scuttling back and forth. "Deshral withdrawn?" the soldier's mind shifted, picturing, as it always did, a mental map of the battlefield, drawn up from real maps assembled hours before. He could see the positions, the terrain, where the men were supposed to be, and what would happen now.

We're flanked...he processed, watching the chain of events unfold in mental vision. The rebels take the hill, then pour through behind his archers, the heavy infantry, committed to the trap, would not be able to redeploy, not with enemies in front, and their position would soon be enveloped. One talon lost and now eight dragons lay in desperate straights. "Why did Deshral withdraw?" Rafan demanded, needing to know, and needing to buy a moment to think, to determine what to do. "He should have been able to hold that hill against a thousand men!"

"He advanced to break a disorganized skirmish force," the messenger managed, repeating what he had been told, nothing more. "Then a larger body overtook his unit."

That simpering Ragara dolt! He's ruined us all! The soldier looked at the hill, and matched the ground to the map in his mind. A single, inevitable conclusion emerged. "We can't loose that hill," he said aloud, low and soft, but clear. "We can't."

Rafan rose to his full height in an instant. "Second!" he shouted, drawing the attention of his immediate subordinate, a mortal man, but a thirty-year veteran who'd commanded archers in the legions his whole life. A man he could trust to do the right thing. "The trap is lost. We must hold the flank at all costs." He was consigning the infantry in front of him to a bloodbath, the dragonlord knew, but he had no choice. Besides, he was about to set his archers to worse. "Pass the order, bind bows and up swords. You are to advance in a wedge and take that hill." He pointed, extending the whole arm. "And then hold at all costs."

"Sir," the veteran saluted, there was nothing more to be said. Both knew sending the archers into melee, with simple swords, poor armor, and little training, meant losses would be immense. They also knew questioning was pointless. "And you sir?" the follow-up was quick and effective.

It was time, Rafan knew, to do what he was truly here to do. Not simply lead and command effectively, any skilled mortal could do that, if perhaps not so well as a dragon-blood, no, it was now that he must stand as a hero. For the men, for the Realm, and for the rest of Creation. It was a duty the soldier understood and accepted. He was a prince of the earth, it was in these moments that it was proven.

If only he wasn't forced to prove it to save them from another exalt's incompetence!

"I'm going to buy you time," he drew his exquisite jade powerbow. "Pass the word to the infantry, we can't help them," Rafan gave his final order of the day. "Up swords!"

"Swords!" five hundred throats echoed the call, but the dragonlord was already turning, already running towards the hill, and the enemy. Alone.

His men were behind him. The path must be cleared. There was no time for hesitation.

Rafan ran.

The map in his mind plotted the course. Three quarters of a mile to the top of the hill, rugged scrubland terrain, but no serious obstacles. He could already place a line across his vision of when he would hit a reasonable range.

Pushing his muscles for everything the dragonlord ran hard, boots pounding over the terrain, the leather slashing against rocks, thorns, and clay, but he called on no essence. He'd need all he could acquire in time. The ragged rebels were already beginning to congeal into a unit on the hill, with advanced squads of their ill-ordered horde gathering.

I have to stop that, Rafan knew. It was the critical component. His archers could break through a loose mob, but with their limited weapons and armor had no chance of striking through any sort of formation. Got to keep that hill clear!

His boots scrapped a cluster of pebbles and skidded across the point he had marked. Two hundred and fifty yards.

He drew an arrow to the mighty powerbow, took quick aim, and fired.

The dragonlord did not pause to watch the arrow strike, trusting in his skill and experience, but ran forward again, reaching, grabbing, and notching a second arrow. He slid across the clay and fired again, and then repeated, advancing in stutter-stop motion at the call of his arrows.

Screams broke the air and heads turned as arrows found flesh and claimed lives. Gray-cloaks swirled on the hill, and there was much pointing and milling in panic.

Rafan's bow claimed two more lives before the fools finally dropped for cover.

He made no more moving shots, but charged hard, closing the remaining distance to leap up onto a random boulder in the center of the hill.

Rebels in gray drew swords, clubs, and odd polearms as they advanced. They grunted cries of death to the Realm, to the exalted, and anything else they thought would steel their resolve against this foe.

Rafan figured the odds at fifty to one or worse.

Survivable...probably.

A knife split the air before him. He sidestepped, but more missiles followed, sometimes no more than stones.

Now the exalt let free his essence, throwing power into motion, quickness, and perception, letting his body flow and flicker between the many attacks, stepping around them all.

Even as he dodged and wove Rafan fired back, his bow snapping with brutal speed, sending broadhead shafts with all the force of mystic jade and perfect form through all-too-frail mortal flesh. He jumped from the boulder, ran right, then left, and then backward, zigzagging to confuse his foes and prevent them from rushing him.

Men went down, red blood staining their dark wraps, and few would ever rise again after those strikes, but they came on. Elemental power poured off Rafan as he continued to draw on his supernatural energy to evade, scurrying and scuttling faster than any lizard had ever crisscrossed those stones. Spiny burrs snapped through the air, a swarming cloud of hard-surfaced barbs to express his fury and the power of the elemental dragons within him.

The rebels, not mad, fell back before him, and for a moment Rafan believed he'd succeeded.

Then he ran out of arrows.

"Hell," he groused when he hand went back to find both quivers empty. He looked about for one moment, noting the absence of any decent vegetation. "The curse of the south," he spat. In the next instant he strapped his bow to its back harness.

"Rush him!" some nameless rebel officer shouted.

Head snapping around to recognize the voice, Rafan flipped forward, unleashing more power to strengthen limbs and energize muscles. His hands planted and he blasted up and over an astonished swordsman, clearing at least twenty feet in the air.

His pull dagger, drawn from the thigh holster, ripped open the officer's throat.

Then a dozen rebels charged from all sides.

The swarm of burrs thickened and spat wrath as more power burst free, empowering Rafan's motions with superhuman grace, the sword an extension of not simply his arms but his thoughts as he parried and struck, cutting and thrusting with the nasty little double-edged blade. Not a master swordsman, the dragonlord was still an expert, and these were but novices, not able to compete with his skill and overwhelming essence force.

They tried to get behind him, he dove forward, blasting through the mob, letting glancing blows patter uselessly against the formidable green jade lamellar he wore.

Powerful though Rafan's charge was, his essence was not limitless, and the press closed about him, restricting movement. Now enemy officers shouted orders, coordinating the rebel assault, and he could not find room to strike back, could only hold to guard, breathing furiously.

Men got too close, and burrs lashed across their flesh, feral spines cutting deep, drawing out hideous bleeding wounds, as the expression of the dragon's blood claimed its own victims.

One man, tall and cruel, with a jagged scar above one eye, saw this and kicked the back of a fellow, propelling him inexorably into Rafan.

The rebel died without ever being touched by a blade, but his corpse had force all its own.

It was but a split-second pause to shove aside the dead weight, but that was one flickering instant too long.

A spear bit into Rafan's back.

He spun and cut it off, willing the wound to close, barely feeling the pain, but knowing more injuries would come if this continued. He was swiftly being surrounded by bodies, and they pressed against his feet. Soon he would fall, and that would be the end. Got to get free!

Drawing on the last of his essence, Rafan barreled into the scarred man, letting the sword cut, simply hurling his body forward to ruin the blow, trusting his exalt-made armor to secure him from injury. He felt steel slide against the jade plating, tearing and squealing in metal anger, but it failed to penetrate.

The man's eyes went wide as he took the exalt's charge, and was thrown back, unable to fall for his fellows behind him.

Rafan's dagger went in beneath the center plate of his armored buff jacket, and as the man's eyes died before him the exalt threw his left leg up onto the handle of that blade and jumped with all the power remaining to him.

A burr-shrouded bolt in the air, countless seeds cast upon the wind, the dragonlord passed over the press and landed facing his foes, who yet turned to see their enemy behind their focus.

"He's unarmed, kill him!" multiple officers called, recovering from shock, and the mob surged, wriggled, and moved to charge.

"For the Realm!"

Boots thudded past Rafan as two men opened ranks just enough to slide by their commander and run on, as a wedge of drawn swords plunged into the unprepared mob that had forgotten their coming.

Rafan took one second to grab a breath.

Then he swooped to the clay, grabbed a sword from among the fallen, and moved to join his men in battle. It was time to clear this place and hold the line. Exhaustion could wait for later.

"We should not have trusted in the auxiliary troops," the speaker used perfectly pronounced High Realm, with excellent diction and a pace that spoke to considerable practice in public speaking. "Their failure to spring the trap as planned resulted in unacceptable casualties among the legion proper."

The speaker was Ragara Deshral, winglord. He was the exact same commander who had idiotically lost his hilltop position only hours before. At his words several of the legion's senior veteran dragon-blooded openly rolled their eyes.

Rafan heard these words and his blood burned. He'd been off that hill for less than four hours, and the red haze was still in him. Not from the enemy, but from the cost. His second was dead, and three hundred men would never see another sunrise, and he'd be lucky to preserve fifty more from infection. The rebels had brought their best against them to turn that hill, and he'd held until there were no more arrows and then two charges extra.

The dragonlord looked to his general, Nellens Hiraut, and waited for a rebuke. None came.

Political connections, a part of Rafan's mind knew, Deshral's father was among the most important in the exceedingly wealthy house, his general a minor scion at best. To complain was politically impossible.

At that moment, politics didn't matter to the dragonlord, he was well past that.

"Unacceptable casualties?" he shouted, and heads turned. Eyes went wide in surprise, for Rafan was known to avoid infighting, to focus on technical matters. "Unacceptable casualties were caused by the auxiliaries?" He was advancing in slow steady steps on Deshral, steps he was not even conscious of taking, but the winglord was blank-faced in utter surprise. "We lost eight hundred men today, out of seven dragons, legion and auxiliary." Rafan's words were cold and biting. "Eight hundred out of thirty-five hundred." Bad casualties by any standard, surely, never mind that they'd faced four times their number. "Three hundred came from one dragon of archers, but if it hadn't been for that one dragon, for those auxiliaries," he said the word so strong he tasted blood on his lips. "We'd have lost everything! The auxiliaries gave their lives to save this legion! And yet now, I hear the very officer, who by his own abject incompetence made that sacrifice necessary, claim the auxiliaries failed the legion? Caused 'unacceptable casualties?' An officer who couldn't complete the childishly simple task of holding one strongpoint against enemy probes?"

Deshral's eyes narrowed, and his countenance grew dark, he was not used to being challenged, but he was copper-skinned with the touch of Fire, and his emotions ran high.

At that moment Rafan's ran far higher. "I will not hear it!" He thundered. "I will not! You will apologize and admit your mistake Winglord, for disparaging the Barbed Fangs!"

"You lying bastard!" Deshal's eyes flared, and flames burst up around him. "You will take back your insults or I'll carve them from your outcaste hide!"

There were gasps from the assembled officers, for no greater insult could be leveled at a legionnaire graduate of Pasiap's Stair, as Rafan was, than to claim he was outcaste, a dragon-blooded of no loyalty who was outside the Scarlet Empire.

Rafan's blood ran from hot to ice cold in an instant. He pulled himself up to his full height, greater than Deshral's by a full three inches. "I will never take back the truth when it concerns the Legions," he spoke every word with slow, cruel clarity. "If you cannot say the same you don't belong in this camp or any other."

"Challenge!" Deshral shouted, and ripped his crimson-fringed daiklave from its back harness. Flames of essence rippled free from his body, and the air burned with furnace heat and rage.

The blade came across and down with blinding speed and strength, the full rage of a Burning Sword unleashed.

Yet it was without guidance or reason, and Rafan saw this clearly, knew exactly what Deshral was doing, and took a single step in anticipation.

The daiklave swept behind him with burning wind as the dragonlord stepped inside the blow, his face a hairsbreadth from the dynast's.

Rafan's pull dagger snapped up in his left hand and drew a long, jagged, red line across the winglord's face, a hideous, unnatural wave wrapping round across the forehead down to the lower edge of the jaw.

Even as the first screams of pain burst from Deshral's throat, Rafan's blade pushed hard against the copper-skinned veins there. "Shut your mouth weakling," Rafan hissed, pushing just enough to enforce compliance. "The blood of Hesiesh flows in you, and it gives you a strength that one day, perhaps, the Realm may need, so I won't spill it all over the floor. Remember that, because if you do not find a way to give something back, the next failure may not be met with such mercy."

Terror left the dynast sobbing and quivering, and Rafan threw him roughly to the ground, hearing the daiklave clatter from his hand.

"General, the dragonlord assaulted me!" Deshral pleaded with Hiruat next. "I want him court-martialed!"

"Winglord Ragara Deshral," the general spoke in a carefully level and deadpan voice. "You have attempted to assault a superior officer in front of witnesses. According to the Thousand Correct Actions I am obligated to punish you, not Dragonlord Geralse Rafan. I urge you in the strongest possible terms to consider this carefully before saying anything further."

Deshral's mouth opened, then closed, and his face filled with fear.

Silence encompassed the command tent, and the general let it linger for a time before filling it up again. "As the wounds have apparently cut too deep to preclude proper debriefing for now, we will reconvene this council in the morning. All are dismissed to their commands to fortify our current position."

The dragon-blooded officers saluted and left, but Rafan knew the matter had not ended there. He might outrank the dynast on the battlefield, but once the swords were sheathed the situation reversed, and there would be consequences to come. I wonder if I can get decent odds on the first assassin's arrival? He thought wryly, not even close to regretting it yet.

There are fewer places grimmer in Creation than an army surgery after a battle. The air inevitably reeks of blood, puss, and death, and fills with the screams and moans of the wounded. No sense can escape the assault, even the tongue is infected by the metallic taste of iron from loose wounds.

Rafan braved it anyway, it was his duty. He had learned field medicine in early days, years before, when his command was much smaller, but he had not forgotten the craft, and with no enemy in sight he would not deprive the wounded of an extra pair of hands. Especially not hands that could draw on the power of the elemental dragons to banish infection at a touch. The power of the wood dragon could heal as well as harm, and though Rafan wielded but the least of these charms, this was enough to save a man struck through the gut, who mortal medicine, and even thaumaturgy, almost always failed.

So he labored on, even though his essence was but barely recovered from the ordeal of battle. How could he give less than everything, when a life was saved each time?

It was terribly late when the dragonlord had done all he could and returned to his own tent to doff his bloodstained armor and feast upon miserably cold stew and flatbread. Fifteen years in the south and I still don't like the food, he thought with such amusement as could be managed.

To his surprise there was a missive resting on his desk, one bearing the general's seal.

He read it quickly. Then paused in disbelief and read it again, slower.

"Damn it all!" Rafan slammed a fist into the desk hard enough to crack the delicate camp furniture, and winced at his lack of control.

His punishment had come faster and fiercer than he had ever expected. "Take a scale of men to Harborhead and recruit additional archers and slingers locally?" It was not an assignment, no matter that casualties might demand new blood for the legion, it was exile. The general was throwing him out, no doubt hoping to preempt any reprimand sent forth from the Deliberative by Deshral's well-connected relatives. Rafan suspected the general thought he was doing him a favor, as such a distant posting might well dissuade the dynast from even bothering with assassins at all.

The dragonlord didn't see it that way. Fifteen years he'd given the Twelfth Legion, and he'd thought to give many more. He stood below only the general and quartermaster now, a rise greater than he'd ever hoped when he'd arrived, and he could not imagine forsaking his duties. There's no one else to command the auxiliaries, he was only too aware of that truth. None of the dynasts, and few of the found eggs, cared much for the secondary troops, thinking them little more than fodder or support for the occasional defense.

There was no fighting the order, and he'd never dream of doing so in any case. Hainaut was his superior, and the order was legitimate, if wasteful. So, I have to go to Harborhead and build up a new army. It was a foolish duty in the extreme, and Rafan knew men would die here because of it. He had talents no replacement would match, that was simply the nature of the exalted. A solid mortal commander could build an army out of new recruits, the legion needed every dragon-blooded on the battlefield in these times, but he could only do the duty he was given.

I hope Deshral can hurry up and get himself killed without taking too many good men with him, Rafan thought, and for the first time regretted his earlier actions. Only this time, he regretted not killing the dynast. The dragon-blooded must save the Realm, and yet some simply wish to poison it.

These dark thoughts kept him awake until exhaustion finally claimed him for sleep.

**Chapter Notes**

The Twelfth Legion is deployed northwest of the Lap at this point, fighting a rebellion among local states there.


	3. Chapter 3

**Chapter 3**

**5 Descending Water**

**RY 769**

Rafan dimly felt something poke his side. At least, he thought something did, his whole body struggled with a cloudy haze of diffuse, thudding pain. Did I get hit with a goremaul? He thought fuzzily, mind struggling to determine anything, eyes closed against a fierce brightness somewhere far above.

Poke. Poke. They moved up and down his side, discrete little jabs, tickling his armor. He felt this, and his reflexes, numbed as they were by pain, interpreted it as an attack.

The dragonlord's eyes snapped open and he jolted upright, reaching out with a gloved hand to knock aside the offending assault.

Or at least he tried to. His eyes rebelled against the brightness of the sun and blinked repeatedly, burning with fatigue still, and his hand completely missed the rough stick that had prodded him, adroitly pulled away as he jerked in clumsy motion.

Feeling rocks and sand beneath him, memory flooded back, and Rafan recalled the storm, and the shipwreck, and the terrible ordeal to reach shore. His eyes blurred and he shaded them with one hand, trying to focus, to find any anchor in his improbable, and extremely painful, survival.

They focused shortly thereafter on an old man, wrinkle-faced and wearing a broad rimmed straw hat, who had been poking him with a hand-carved walking stick. The old man chuckled at his struggles, revealing a mouth with a mere handful of teeth remaining. "Morning, sir," the elder wheezed, still chuckling. "It appears fate did not decide you were best suited for the gulls and crabs after all."

Possibly I should be offended, Rafan thought. His hair might be cropped short, but it was still dark green, his eyes dark emeralds, and his skin bore traces of bark-like patterning. Add that to his jade armor and powerbow and no man could not know him as exalted. However, laughing at death had a certain universal appeal, and he couldn't help but grin back at the old man. "I suspect," the exalt managed to sit upright, a minor victory for the moment. "I'd be rather tough on their stomachs, so it's likely better for all of us."

"A fair sentiment indeed," the old man chuckled, holding out a wrinkled hand. "And you are more impressive than any crab that has washed ashore in a great many years, so it has proven a good day to come scavenging."

The implied jest, that this man had once found a crab that was more impressive than a man in artifact lamellar, brought a second smile to Rafan's face. He took the elder's hand, though gently, and struggled to his feet, wincing as muscles protested. He'd not felt so sore since the first days at the Stair, at least, perhaps never. "You collect crabs elder?" It seemed an odd hobby.

"There are surprisingly many kinds," the old man chuckled, then grinned widely. "And some taste much better than others. A suitable way for an old man to keep busy and get out before the children wake in the morning." He leaned about his staff and offered a generous bow. "I am Prefect Murich Olten. Well met, Emerald Dragon."

"Well met," Rafan replied, nodding his head in respect according to station. "Where am I?" He did not give his rank yet, it might not be respected in all places, and he could not tell from the nearby plants where this place was, though it did not match memories of Harborhead.

"You are in Renburg Township," Olten explained readily, clearly not offended. "On the Island of Thistles."

Rafan understood geography, having studied it extensively. It was a weapon or war, and more, and he could draw Creation in his mind better than most. He had some idea where he might have landed. The storm had been fierce, but it could only have carried him so far. "Thistles?" He mulled. "That is on the edge of the River Province, west of Thorns and north of the Bayou of Endless Regret."

"You are correct sir," the magistrate seemed pleased at this piece of knowledge.

So, the storm blew us far enough at that, Rafan considered. He was more than five hundred miles north of Harborhead, with high mountains and one of the most inhospitable shadowlands in Creation between them, but at least he had landed on friendly soil. "I am Dragonlord Geralse Rafan, of the Twelfth Legion."

"Dragonlord?" the old man's mouth felt open, and he quickly dropped to his knees.

Rafan grabbed and caught him before he could fall to the rocky beach, though it strained his weakened arms. "None of that now," he ordered. "I've been lying on a beach for at least a night, this is no parade ground." Besides, the soldier thought silently. Dragonlord I may be, but I've no troops, and nothing more than my rank to my name. He was a member of the dragon-blooded host, yes, but not a name that resounded.

"Of course sir," Olten straightened, seeming to take this in stride. "You were shipwrecked then? I thought perhaps sorcery...or...some other means..."

"Unfortunately no," Rafan shook his head. "A shame, it would probably have hurt less."

"Doubtless true," the wizened head bobbed sagely beneath the straw. "Whence have you come dragonlord?"

"Warve," Rafan grimaced to think on those memories. When he caught the blank look on the old man's face he added. "In the South, to the west of the Lap."

Olten rubbed his chin with a gnarled hand. "That is...distant," he betrayed a common lack of geographic knowledge. The soldier was not surprised, it was a rare man who understood the lay of Creation well, even many exalted were shockingly ignorant. "You were bound for the Blessed Isle then?"

"No, I was traveling to Harborhead," Rafan countered, not abrupt. "On military business. Now it seems I will be late." And I've left twenty-five men behind, food for the storm mother and her servants no doubt. Damn. He grimaced, and caught Olten stepping back with a slightly fearful gaze. "Apologies," the soldier muttered hastily, though it was somewhat demeaning to speak the words. "I lost men coming here, and I am used to the company of soldiers."

"Of course sir," the prefect seemed to accept this. "No doubt you have been through much. Perhaps we should retire to Renburg for the present?"

"Good idea," Rafan took a moment to look around, his eyes having adjusted now. Loose rocks and stones formed much of this small beach cove, and trees rose high about it. There were hills inland, and he caught sight of terraced fields and neatly arrayed orchards. It reminded him somewhat of the Blessed Isle, where he had not been in years. "Though it's a fair beach."

"So it is, yes," Olten chuckled, and shuffled along, leaning on his staff.

They walked in silence long enough to pass over the dunes and on to a local trail. From there Rafan could see a neatly laid shoreline village perhaps a mile to the south. Farmland spread out as far as he could see, receding only as the hills rose inland, where green pastures took their place. Terraces and orchards dominated, not the rice paddies most common in much of Creation, though they existed in the lowlands. Perhaps the soil drains from those peaks too swiftly, for it was not far inland before they land rose rapidly, for rice to prosper, the soldier reasoned. This minor oddity aside, it was clearly a land of great fertility, and a welcome sight after the generally barren desert scrub of his many years in the south.

"I must imagine you wish to continue on to Harborhead," Olten offered as they proceeded. The elderly prefect was hale, and set a steady pace, but his old legs had clearly lost any speed. Rafan, seasoned to long hard marches, had to force his pace slow. The pain in his limbs helped.

"Yes, I suppose I must," the soldier replied, though he felt no eagerness for another sea voyage in that moment. "Duty demands it. I will need to send a message to my commander as soon as practical as well."

"The resources of Renburg are at your disposal my lord," Olten offered, and this struck the memory in Rafan that this island was a tributary of the Realm. "But it is a small town of nine hundred souls, and there is little enough we can do."

Rafan nodded at this, taking it in stride, such troubles were only to be expected.

"Renburg is on the northwest edge of Thistles," Olten continued. "The city of Kyburg is south of us some twenty miles. There are fishermen there who travel wide over the Inland Sea and the reefs off the Bayou. A skilled captain could no doubt reach Kirighast. The city ought to have a thaumaturge able to relay a message as well, though I have not been in over a year."

It would do, the dragonlord decided, for a start at least. "Your advice is appreciated, though I think I will leave that till tomorrow. The sea's pounding it not easily resisted by any man."

"It will be our honor to have such an illustrious guest," Olten spoke solemnly.

Rafan started to protest, then stopped himself, knowing it would be pointless. Not that he had any real objection to being feasted, but it could be such a fuss. He was not experienced dealing with common people, having devoted almost all his adult life to soldiery, one way or another. The rules of behavior were...different.

When they came upon Renburg the dragonlord inevitably became an instant sensation. Men and women left their daily tasks to gawk and question, astounded at the strange visitor. Rafan held back, letting Olten answer, as if the man were a subordinate officer or local auxiliary. The elderly prefect handled the task aptly, relating the circumstances succinctly and keeping the people at a decent distance. Rafan need deliver only crisp, modest answers to simple questions, that he was from the Twelfth Legion, and yes it is all real jade, and so forth.

Instead the dragonlord kept his eyes elsewhere. He looked to the people first. They seemed a vigorous, prosperous folk. Not so glamorous as those of the Blessed Isle of course, but there was none of the half-starved nature found on even those of well-watered towns in the south. Some of the residents bore the scars and marks of disease, but all appeared to eat enough to endure their labors well. Their clothing and bearing was unfamiliar to him, with modest resemblance to the fashions of the Blessed Isle, but also differences. It was not the garb of the Scavenger Lands, at least not in the depictions he had seen. Their architecture held similar oddity, a styling harkening back to old forms of construction, but also fluid and florid in a way he'd never before observed. It was all stone and stucco, the town had no buildings of wood at all.

Perhaps the people of Thorns live in this way, Rafan guessed. It was the only place of note for hundreds of miles, after all.

There was one other oddity. While most of the populace seemed overjoyed to have a dragon-blood among them, the dragonlord caught dark looks out of the corner of his eyes. Middle-aged men and women mostly, and both of the town guards he observed. It was not malice exactly, just a sort of indirect discontent. Such reactions were common in foreign lands were the Realm's luminaries were rarely seen, but it puzzled Rafan to find it here.

Olten led the soldier to the town's sole tavern. "I would offer you my own home, sir," the prefect explained with quiet sadness. "But since my wife passed three years before it has not been prepared for guests. I am sorry to saddle you with such rough accommodations."

Rafan laughed, his mind scurrying over a thousand memories of encampments just one step short of Hell. "I suspect, prefect, that our definitions of rough are rather far apart. The life of a legionnaire is not for dilettantes." He grimaced again. At least, it wasn't until recently.

"I suppose," the elder muttered, clearly dissatisfied. It was obvious he wished to put the best presentation forth that he could. The dragonlord took solace in the man's earnest commitment, far more than any hurried village display might have earned.

The tavern was mostly empty at this hour. Though it was yet early the folk were already at work, in the nearby fields or, Rafan suspected, out fishing. The mistress of the house was in the kitchen when they entered, cleaning up a meal already done.

The master of the house, clearly warned in advance, was present, and offered the dragon-blood a welcome and his choice of anything he wished. The solider appreciated this, having discovered on the walk up that he had lost everything but armor and bow to the sea, including his small store of cash and, worse, his pull dagger, a blade he'd carried through a dozen engagements. He hoped the blade had sunk to the ocean floor, and was not in the hands of some opportunistic elemental now.

It took only a few seconds in enclosed air, smelling strongly of hot food, for the exalt's flesh to discover an immense hunger from his previous exertions. "Make whatever suits your taste master," Rafan offered, letting his voice rise to instantly dominate the twittering conversation around him, a simple command trick. "But bring it forth with due speed, for I am famished."

He was seated across from the prefect with considerable speed, and Rafan was suddenly facing a plate filled with pickled vegetables, cooked porridge, and some kind of cheese he did not immediately recognize. He dug in with alacrity.

Ground and cooked grains, however seasoned, fit into the soldier's definition of 'mash' and inevitably tasted the same everywhere in Creation. After a while the stomach stopped caring, hot and filling was enough, and this was both, more than that Rafan simply could not have said regardless. Likewise the pickles, preserved from the last harvest as it was still winter, tasted as all their kind did. The cheese, however, was unexpectedly good, having a refined, full flavor he had not expected in such a small place, and Rafan looked at a second piece with more care, noting delicate lines of color and mixed texture.

"Goat," Olten answered the unasked question. "The island is much prized for her cheeses. We are not contest winners here, but I find we have done well enough."

"That you have," the dragonlord's hunger forestalled further conversation and he tore into the remainder, clearing the plate rapidly. Another came to replace it with equal speed, this time with fish, seasoned with almonds, and a dark red wine. This too was unexpectedly good, especially the vintage, though Rafan was a poor judge of such things. Accustomed to the field, he drank only sparingly.

"There are good grapes here," Olten added, raising his own narrow glass. "Thistles has never exported to the Realm, but the vintages are always popular in Thorns-" he stopped suddenly, and his eyes lowered to the table. "That is, they were popular in Thorns."

"A tragedy, and an insult," Rafan agreed immediately. Now that battle, he thought briefly. There would be glory for the legions. Of course, the Houses would never commit to it. The Empress would have, he was sure. Where had she gone?

He shook his head roughly to clear away the dark thoughts. No need to ruin the mood. "It seems you have rich soil on this island," the soldier steered the conversation in a safer direction.

"Yes," Olten smiled brightly. "The land is a bit rough, and our many hills are hard on an old man's knees, but she is a fine land for all that."

Rafan moved onto another fish, and then a bowl of hearty stew and additional cheese, clearing four plates and the better part of a fifth before finishing. "I have not eaten so well in over a year," Probably longer, the solider thought, being honest, he had found little to like in the cuisine of the Lap, even when not on campaign. "You have a fine establishment here master."

The tavern-keeper positively glowed at the compliment.

"There are rooms upstairs," the prefect explained. "Humble, but clean, and a modest bath behind. Take your rest, sir, I will keep the curious away, though I must ask your forbearance to hold something of a feast tonight. No Prince of the Earth has visited Renburg since I was a boy of ten."

Rafan smiled, the man was old enough that might mean no one else in the village had ever seen a dragon-blooded. It was always good to remind the people that they were there. "I have no objections." Indeed, he thought. It will be good to be feasted out of cheer, rather than the fear that is so common. That was the usual response, as a dragonlord normally arrived in a small village accompanied by hundreds of armed men, never a good way to begin.

The exalted heal quickly, and by nightfall the dragonlord felt as hale as ever, which made the Renburger's feast far more pleasant than it might otherwise have been.

Fish featured heavily, being the only truly fresh food available, though the villagers had slaughtered a goat with much sacrificing, and presented Rafan with the best parts. He was rather sparring with those, mutton is the most common meat of soldiers, and takes on a certain familiar hatred over time. There was much dancing, storytelling, and even a small archery contest, with Olten explaining that the bow was learned by most on the island, and used to hunt fowl and guard herds in the uplands. Pressed to participate, Rafan won the contest with practiced ease, though he was honest when he praised the skill of the locals, for they were not without talent.

It was all very ribald and rustic, lacking in class but with a very vibrant and honest enthusiasm the soldier found quiet welcoming. Southerners, with harsh and often brutally divided societies, were rarely so free, and never so around the legionaries they considered outsiders. These folk reminded him more than anything of his childhood home, far in the north. It was enough to get him to dance, something he would never dare at a formal gala. Though Rafan had a quick step, he always felt incredibly provincial when surrounded by dynasts. These islanders would never tell.

He had no shortage of willing partners in such an endeavor, as what was surely every unmarried girl within ten miles had clearly done her utmost to make an appearance. Likely some of the married ones too, the soldier guessed. He knew many in his place might have tried to grasp as many as possible, the emerald dragons had an incorrigible reputation that way. Rafan was no such man, excessive teasing and callous toying with affection brought back poor memories of early days he'd rather forget.

Not that it meant he'd turn down his chances, soldiers put aside much as it was. No, he picked out a vivacious raven-haired girl of about eighteen and made his attentions clear early on in the evening. Pale skinned and with long tresses, she was far from a southerner, which made her prettier in his eyes and she proved suitably energetic fun during the night. He did not fall asleep until late indeed.

**Chapter Notes**

The Island of Thistles is the offshore island slightly to the west of Thorns. Based on the map of Creation it runs about 150 miles east to west and 60-70 miles north to south. This makes it roughly the size of the island of Sicily, and it is located such that there would be strong climatic similarities as well, so much of the geography has been modeled accordingly.


	4. Chapter 4

**Chapter 4**

**6 Descending Water**

**RY 769**

Rafan did not sleep long.

A bitter cry and terrified screams woke him seemingly a mere moment after finally pulling the sheets over the young lady.

He was up instantly, and throwing armor on even as his eyes adjusted to the dim light of the one sputtering candle. That required no vision, his instructors at the Stair had made them drill the practice blindfolded in the rain until every man could perform the action perfectly.

The black-haired girl was just rising from the bed, blinking in shock and confusion, as the dragonlord strapped on his bow, grabbed a quiver he'd secured during the contest earlier, and swept through the door. "Stay inside," Was all he had time to relay.

He beat a path downstairs and out the back, that door was closer, before surging around the square. He was barefoot on the packed earth, but didn't care. Panicked people ran past, faces split with terror.

"The dead!" a man cried in the distance. "The dead are here! They'll eat us all!"

Renburg was laid out in a long L-shape, along a modest hill among the fields. The square was at the interchange. The dragonlord had memorized this layout earlier, out of tried and true practice. The cry came from the top of the long end. He looked there, straining his eyes in the weak light of the half-moon.

Men and women ran down the street in panic. Dark shapes moved behind them. Rafan could not see them in detail at this distance, but he did not need to. The way they moved revealed enough. They did not walk, they shambled, jerking on misplaced and haltingly positioned limbs, cracking and lurching their progress.

Zombies.

"Run!" Rafan heard a voice nearby, and spun to see one of the town's handful of guards shouting. "Run, head for the fields, clear the town!"

"No!" Rafan's voice rose thunderous before he even knew what he was going to say, it was pure instinct, tactical practice ground into his bones. "No!" he repeated, letting the pieces fall together. "They will not follow, they'll comb house to house and kill the terrified, the weak, the old." He looked up the road again, trying to guess numbers from those shamblers. It is not so wide, he figured, gauge depth, add some spread amongst the buildings. Perhaps one hundred, he suspected. Good enough. "We must fight!"

"Fight?" the guardsman blanched, eyes wide with fear. "But they're dead, their touch is sickness and they eat men."

"They have died once, and can die again!" Rafan roared, and he let a bit of essence free now, enhancing his voice, making his body seem stronger, taller, more powerful than an ordinary man. He had to beat their fear, had to beat it right now! "Are you men or dogs? Will you not defend your homes?"

People stopped running. These islanders had spent all day demonstrating their pride to him, and he shamed them back to it now.

"But how?" the guardsman, a youth Rafan guessed had never fought more than a few drunken sailors, begged.

"Form a line of spears in the street," Rafan gestured, seizing the moment immediately. "Grab staves, pitchforks, oars, whatever will serve, but form a line and hold them. Every man and woman with a bow behind. They will fall, I'll show you!" He pulled forth a single arrow, though the range was yet long, and took aim. Essence channeled down his arms, stronger and sharper than any man, and the powerbow hummed as his power flew into the arrow itself, granting it a sliver of the dragon's grace.

A swarm of burrs blossomed into existence about him as he let free the broadhead shaft.

Far down the street a shambling corpse clawing at a door had its head ripped clear to pulpy shreds by the thorn-coated projectile, and it crumpled to the dirt.

"Now form a line and hold!" Rafan's words crashed down on the dumbstruck townsfolk. He pulled back and fired again, releasing no more essence, but simply letting his exquisite powerbow do the work, and striking down a second zombie, albeit less dramatically.

The dragonlord continued to shoot as the Renburgers grabbed makeshift spears and retrieved their bows, forming a ragged wall behind him, and considerably tighter ranks of archers past that.

The undead did not stand idle. Some force directed them, as the dragonlord knew it must, and this master shepherded his minions in what semblance of a rush the shambling creatures could manage.

Firing with all the considerable speed he could attain Rafan repeatedly struck at the lead zombie, again and again, focusing on the singular purpose of slowing their onslaught. Not all his arrows destroyed the monsters, dead flesh was durable, but each fell, becoming a stumbling block for its fellows.

Then his hands closed on nothing, all twenty shots depleted. The dragonlord's head shot back, noting the assembled villages, ready at last. They stood with bows and spears high even as the dead reached within arm's length of the exalt.

"Shoot you fools!" Rafan thundered. "Fire! You can't hit me!"

After an agonizing moment of terrible silence someone finally fired, and unleashed the storm of arrows.

The dragon-blood reached down and called upon the essence of the element of wood within him, invoking its power, and the arrows swerved past his body as he ducked beneath the spray, their shafts rebelling at the call of his flesh, seeking the dead instead. It would take greater hands than these villages to strike him with a weapon of wood.

Dead shamblers fell, rotten flesh and sinews torn by broadhead points of steel, but their numbers were great, and they were beyond pain or reason. They came on.

Rafan reached to his hip for his pull dagger even as he recalled its loss. "Damn," he hissed, and rolled right instead, sliding under the reaching claws of hungry corpses. He let more essence loose to propel his motion, evading any incoming blows.

Moments later, as vacant eyes turned to surge toward the exalt, Rafan grasped one of the torch poles erected earlier. That'll do, he decided, and laid about him with swift, snapping strikes.

White bones cracked beneath those blows, and the leering hands receded.

Then a zombie to the right moved with sudden speed, and snapped upright to lunge from frightfully close with a sharp, serrate blade.

The dragon-blood, caught by surprise, bent at the waist, but failed to dodge much of the blow. Thankfully, his armor proved greater than the weak weapon, and steel scrapped across jade lamellar without penetrating.

"Nemissary!" Rafan spat as he identified the ghostly puppeteer that surely held this corpse in thrall. He snapped around, loosing essence to enhance his blow, and struck so hard across the face of the corpse-minion he snapped the simple pole in two.

The nemissary laughed, dead eyes glowing with hellish green light, and then grunted as the dragon-blood speared the sharply broken cylinder into its rotted heart.

The zombie fell, but only moments later another corpse straightened and lunged with impressive speed. "Die dog of the Realm!" the nemissary hissed, unfazed by the loss of one host.

Blocking the charge with his improvised spear, Rafan struck back with a fist to that leering face from his off-hand, ignoring the spray of gore that drenched his gloves. He felt zombie claws rake pointlessly across his armor and then slammed the butt of his pole repeatedly into the dead thing's chest. "Stay down you miserable maggot-spawn!"

"I will rip out your throat!" the nemissary jumped from one body to another and threw a heavyset zombie at Rafan from the side, even as a storm of burrs scourged flesh so close as the dragon-blood's anima flared.

"Get off you damned ghost!" the dragonlord was not much for unarmed fighting, having always preferred to shoot his enemies from dozens of yards away, but he'd been in enough camp brawls over the years to handle himself. He elbowed the thing in the stomach, then pushed further up, feeling ribs crack even as the creature managed a hand to his neck.

Acting on a sudden inspiration Rafan's feet hopped forward, his bare soles landing atop the zombie's own twisted heels. Then he put all his strength into springing the rest of his body upwards.

With brutally cracking pops the corpse's backbone separated from his hips, leaving two squirming halves.

Gnarled fingers slipped from the exalt's neck at the spirit was thrown from the body.

Rafan looked about to discover the square was suddenly quiet. Zombies twitched in the dirt, torn limbs struggling to obey their last commands, but the line of villagers held behind him, and there were still bows raised.

A chill hideous whisper, visible as nothing more than a wavy distortion in the darkness before Rafan's eyes, spoke then. "Be not proud you have claimed these shells, it is nothing to me. I cannot be killed by you."

Damn the thing, Rafan cursed silently. It was right. There were charms to compel and harm such bodiless monsters, but he did not know them. He was trained to fight living, breathing enemies, not the dead.

"Enjoy your hollow little stand," the nemissary hissed to the assembled crowd. "It has bought you only a little while and nothing more."

Faces blanched, and many fell to their knees. Rafan wished for something to say, but he knew words were pointless without actions here.

Then the blur in the air was breached by a small paper strip, carried through the winds on a cloth bag that exploded in a little spray of white crystals when it passed through the space.

The nemissary howled in an agony no mortal could imitate. It tried to flee, but the salt spilling from that bag held it fast in place.

Rafan caught the arrival of a young man, wearing a simple robe, and with a shaven head. He carried a staff carved with arcane symbols. "Emerald dragon!" the monk, for Rafan knew he must be, shouted. "Strike!" and threw the staff.

The dragonlord caught the weapon in his right hand, and whirled it overhead as he might a spear, passing it through the screaming wraith twice, then executing a brutal thrust for good measure.

With a horrific keen the nemissary dispersed into nothingness.

The people of Renburg did not cheer, it had been a victory strange and terrible, but the relief that spread out amongst them was palpable and obvious to Rafan. He did not focus on them just yet, instead looking to the newest arrival.

The young monk covered the distance quickly, stopping before the dragon-blood and bowing deeply at the waist. Rafan passed him back his staff the moment he straightened. "Who are you Immaculate?"

"I am Blue Crab sir," the monk answered, taking his weapon carefully. "I maintain the shrines here." He turned to the villagers. "My humblest apologies for being late, by I had not heard the struggle until I reached the Ring Road."

"You are an exorcist?" Rafan questioned. The monk was a youth, surely not much past twenty, and his name indicated his limited rank. It seemed odd.

"Nothing so grand sir," Blue Crab shook his head humbly. "But the Vartabed has commanded training for all, and has dispersed warded staves across the island."

That was an interesting fact, the dragonlord made a point of noting, but one that would wait. "What will happen to the nemissary?" he questioned. Occult creatures were not at the center of his knowledge.

"It may perish, if the dragons are kind," the monk answered. "But such an aged spirit is unlikely to be destroyed so easily. Even so, it is returned to the Underworld to whatever place holds it there. We can only hope that it far from here. It will be some days before it reforms regardless."

"Good," It wasn't, exactly, but it would do, and the dragonlord wished to project confidence for the villages. "Don't leave." He told Blue Crab, and turned back to the crowd. "You did well, all of you." It was honest praise. They had fought successfully against an enemy that, if not extremely deadly, was utterly terrifying. Rafan searched and found the familiar face of the guardsman who had spoken earlier. "What are our losses?"

"Arblin's gone," the man's face was filled with sadness, but he stood steady. "The thing took his face off even with a pitchfork in its chest. Esse, Timun, and Fren are all hurt pretty bad." He pronounced this in sepulchral tones, for all knew the stories of the terrible diseases carried by the dead.

Rafan judged his anima had eased enough to no longer injure others. "Everyone with a wound, any wound, step forward." He moved to kneel beside a middle-aged man, the one identified as Timun, whose chest had been brutally torn. The wounds had been bandaged, hastily but with sufficient skill to prevent further bleeding.

Carefully the exalt laid a single hand upon the man's chest. "I cannot heal your injuries," he spoke solemnly to the wide-eyed townsman. "That lies beyond my power, but by acting now, I can preserve you against all infection, even from their touch." It was the exertion of only a minimal quantity of power to do so, and Rafan acted now accordingly. There was a satisfaction to healing that even the most righteous killing did not offer. "Bring the others in turn," he told the guardsmen.

Most of those hurt had minor injuries, struck by errant blows from zombies dying on spears, and walked and knelt before the wood aspect's touch. Rafan believed that with his aid not one would die of wounds suffered here. One life lost for one hundred, not a bad outcome, the dragonlord considered. Foolish to attack this place with so few, they never had enough to win. He suspected that had never been the goal in the first place.

When he was finished Rafan turned back to the guardsman. "Gather three groups, fifteen apiece. One to each end of the road and the others to circle until morning. Come find me in the tavern if there is any disturbance. I do not think they will return, but vigilance is essential."

"Sir!" the guard saluted without professionalism, but with good enthusiasm. Rafan suspected he could be trusted to the task.

"Monk, Prefect," he could not see Olten, but the old man was surely there. "We must talk."

They met in the tavern, sitting before the banked fire. Both mortals sat across from the dragonlord, and looked at him with open trepidation. Rafan considered matters in silence for a time before speaking. Where to begin? He wondered. There were many questions, but he doubted these two could answer more than a few. He turned to Blue Crab first. "No such force was raised here." That was obvious, these folk were good solid immaculates, not the sort of heretics to permit necromancy nearby. "How did they arrive?"

"The Broken Gull," the monk spoke with deep sadness. "A shadowland up the beach some two miles. Ten years ago a slave galley bound for the Blessed Isle crashed there, and lost all hands and cargo. It was enough to create a small shadowland. We have salted the ground, but the tide makes this...difficult." The monk grimaced, and Rafan nodded in understanding. He could see how that would be a problem. "The shadowland recedes slowly as a result. It is only a few yards across now, and will be gone in a few years, but there is enough space for them to come through, give a few hours."

"It was warded," Olten amended, looking at the monk with an unspoken accusation. "I checked those myself, often."

"I will go again in the morning Prefect," Blue Crab quickly promised, but scowled at the air as he looked back at Rafan. "My wards are good, sir, and senior brothers anchored several to large boulders. Someone must have broken through."

"The nemissary," Rafan decided immediately. "I imagine it may have claimed the bodies of one of my soldiers, washed up on shore. That would have allowed it to scratch the wards from the other side, yes?"

"That it possible," Blue Crab nodded.

"We will have to search the shore for bodies then," Olten determined swiftly. "And perform proper rites for the fallen."

"Burn them," Rafan instructed grimly. "It is proper for soldiers far from home."

"As you command lord," the prefect acknowledged.

"Now," the dragonlord stared deep into the eyes of both men, looking for lies. "Why send a hundred zombies against this village? It was not intended to conquer, they had insufficient numbers. They wished to rout the people and kill the stragglers. I am foreign here, give me the reason, the hand that moved this force." The use of the coastal shadowland, the nemissary on the other side to disable the wards. These spoke to the soldier's mind of a concerted effort, a directed maneuver as part of a larger scheme. Something was happening, and he needed to know what it was.

"There can only be one source sir," Olten spoke with terrible resignation. "I suppose it was inevitable. The tyrant of Thorns has decided to claim us at last."

It was easy to understand who the old man meant. The so-called 'Deathlord.' The Mask of Winters, an unknowable monster who had taken the great city the moment the Scarlet Throne was revealed to be empty. Opportunistic bastard, Rafan thought, even as he had to admire the audacity of the move.

"He'll not claim this village with a hundred corpses," Blue Crab shot back. "We're too many, we can fight back."

Rafan caught the look on Olten's face then, and the pieces fell together. Yes, you can fight back, at least to some degree. He let his mind run through the battle without his presence. The people following the word of the panicked guards, running free to the fields, most out-distancing the slow zombies. The corpse force crawling house by house, slaying the old, the sick, the children, and the terrified. The young monk returning, rallying the villages, and whatever neighbors they had, charging back into the village at dawn with a militia hundreds strong.

They would have found nothing, Rafan guessed. Even if the dead could not have retreated back to the Underworld in time, he would bet anything the nemissary would simply march his zombies a few hundred yards into the ocean, where they could not be followed. The people would have found nothing but devastation and death. The nemissary might well have even tried to burn whatever he considered readily flammable. It was a formulaic campaign of terror, something he'd seen a dozen times in the south by marauding nomads against water-rich oasis communities.

Not a typical tactic for the dead, the dragonlord guessed, but a wise choice here. He pulled the greater map into his mind again. Yes, the Mask of Winters has hatched a cunning plan. The deathlord had powerful enemies to the north, Lookshy for one, he would not wish to commit much here, but ruining the island through terror could be done with few, especially when using the horrific dead.

"Yes, you will fight, monk," Rafan spoke firmly, steadily, commanding without giving orders. "You must renew your wards, and set permanent guard upon the shadowland. They will no doubt try again, likely with worse than zombies. It is not for Renburg to stand alone, however," the dragon-blood decided, and turned to Olten. "My plans have changed, prefect. I must make for the capital of this island with all speed. The Satrap must be alerted."

The two mortals looked at each other, and their faces fell wretchedly. Immense confusion warred in Rafan. Surely he had offered reassurance, aid?

At length, Olten turned back and spoke. "Sir, I am afraid you are misinformed," he spoke slowly, trembling visibly, holding back a strange rage. "There is no Satrap."

Rafan blinked repeatedly, his mind struggling to assimilate this news. "But Thistles is a tributary of the Scarlet Empire, the satrap is..." he struggled for the name. "Larran, yes, Nellens Larran I believe." Geography his passion, the dragonlord could place every Realm satrapy in Creation on a map, and knew of their leaders.

Olten rapped wrinkled fingers against the table, saying nothing. After a moment the young monk filled the silence. "Sir," he spoke very softly. "Satrap Nellens Larran left Thistles six months after Thorns fell to the Deathlord. He took his whole household, all of the members of the Satrap's office, and every other holding of the Realm."

"Left?" The solider could not believe it. The satrap, a dynast appointed my the empress herself, had just...gone home. How could anyone forsake his duty like that? "But how? Why was no one appointed?"

"We do not know," Olten's voice was laced with bitterness. "There has been no explanation. From the capital I have been told that our quota for the Realm has been 're-purposed' for local use. The Realm has abandoned us sir."

"Sir," Blue Crab added cautiously. "I believe you may be the only dragon-blooded on the entire island at present."

It was too much for Rafan to accept. He stood abruptly, stomping two full circuits of the common room, fuming, and fighting the urge to punch something. The realm had abandoned the island? Every dragon-blooded soul had simply gone home to the Blessed Isle?

Rafan was a soldier. When orders had changed to provide less support to the Threshold due to the disappearance of the Empress he had disagreed, but accepted it. When equipment and funding to the legions had been cut he had grumbled, but striven to do more with what remained. This, this...travesty...he could not countenance.

We do not forsake our duty!

Focus on the present, he managed to organize his thoughts after this mental scream of release, insufficient though it was. Don't worry about parts of the battlefield you cannot affect, face the enemy in front of you. The old proverb helped. The satrap was gone, he had to work within that context. "Who rules the island then?"

"The Viceroy," Blue Crab chirped helpfully. "Viceroy Benison Jortan. His office is at the capital, Carduburg, to the northeast."

"To be honest sir," Olten added slowly. "He has ruled for fifteen years. Nellens Larran did little to...direct...the government."

Treasonous though it might be to agree, Rafan was familiar with such affairs. It was not uncommon for a dynast to let a local conduct most business while focusing on other matters. Sometimes it was even a course of true wisdom, rather than simple sloth. "Then I will go and see the Viceroy," Rafan determined. "Whatever the politics, a warning must be relayed." That was a military fact, he was comfortable with military facts. The politics of abandoning a satrapy were a swamp beyond his bravery. "How far to Carduburg?"

"A hundred miles, as the falcon flies," the monk answered. "But only the Ring Road will carry you swiftly. Half again as much that way."

"Have you a good horse?" Rafan asked. He was no expert, but he could ride, and he could demand horses along the way. Two days, perhaps, if I push.

"The magistrate has one, for journeys among the hill pastures," Olten replied. "I could have it here in an hour."

"Do so," the dragonlord instructed. "I will eat and then leave quickly. It is important the viceroy receives the news before our enemy does."

"A wise decision," the prefect agreed, and the discussion flowed immediately into preparation.

The hour went swiftly. Rafan roused the master to provide a quick meal and sufficient bread and cheese for the journey. He gathered together his bow and armor, found new arrows, boots, and a serviceable dagger, though it was not the welcome familiarity of what he had lost, and a hat for the sun.

It was not a particularly grand horse, he discovered, but the animal looked fit and clean, and that would do for a few hours hard riding. "I will see her returned soon," he told the magistrate, having to shout over the well-wishers who trailed him out of town.

I will reach the viceroy in two days, Rafan swore as the people cheered and sobbed to see him go. He had fought for the Realm and its tributaries for fifteen years and could not ever recall such honest support. It was not something he was about to fail.

**Chapter Notes**

The concept of a shadowland on a beach is not something covered by canon, but it seems inevitable that shipwreck events would produce such things, and so I have utilized it here.


	5. Chapter 5

**Chapter 5**

**7 Descending Water**

**RY 769**

Viceroy Benison Jortan worked late, despite the strain it put on his aching joints. He had too many tasks before him not to take the necessary time, sleep was a luxury a man in his position could ill afford, not when he was obligated to fulfill the responsibilities of two people. That would have been hard enough in everyday affairs, but in this time of crisis was an incredible burden.

For the moment he analyzed a report by the customs officers of the port. Duties from the various mercantile expeditions to 'Port Calin' were down several percent from what they ought to have been, though still above last year's average. This was not a surprise to the governor, he knew full well how few of those ships made it all the way north to the free port above the Yanaze. Most were stopping at Celeren or Lookshy and transferring through suitable go-betweens, never mind that officially such trade was illegal and could run only through the Guild factors and their ruinous rates.

In principle Jortan ought to oppose such practices, in practice he wished the smugglers good luck. Nine in ten ships had once gone straight east, to the shining city there. That trade was gone, and his order forbidding contact with the un-living state seemed to be holding, for now. The viceroy suspected that had little to do with his writ and more with the pathetic mercantile practices of the dead. With Realm-sanctioned trading partners gone he had no qualms accepting the semi-legal alternatives his merchants had found. His office needed every dinar the duties could supply.

Considering this he drafted a brief order increasing the rate of customs inspections, hoping to increase compliance and recoup some of those lost few percent. Additionally he chose to increase the tax exemption for metal arms and armor put in place two years previous. Trading profits for blades was a simple choice, and he was now certain the auditors would never come.

Perhaps, the viceroy mused for the thousandth time, if there are sufficient accounting irregularities someone will launch an investigation. He welcomed the treason charge that would inevitably bring, since it would mean someone greater than he had finally decided to care.

In the quiet glare of lamplight Jortan could admit the true scope of his despair by noting it was a hope so grim as that he clung to.

Unexpectedly there came a knock at the door.

The viceroy's head rose, surprised. Most of the other bureaucrats had already retired, only his secretary and a small number of servants remained awake. "Yes Sessil, what is it?" Jortan called to his secretary, admitting him.

"My lord," Sessil was a thin youth with a pock-marked face from childhood infection, a poor speaker and easily intimidated. He seemed an unusual choice for secretary, but Jortan had discovered the boy had an astounding head for sums and a very rapid hand and snatched up his services. That the young man's reaction to the kindness had been boundless loyalty was simply a bonus. "The Captain of the Guard has a man here to see you."

The Captain has? Jortan considered this very odd, only an unusual petitioner for an audience would be brought forward in such a way, an outsider who did not know the local doctrine. "At this hour?" he questioned. It was awfully late, normally the veteran guardsman would have made any visitor wait until morning.

"The man insisted," Sessil's lips twitched at this seeming impropriety.

"Who is this visitor then?" the viceroy was struck by the terrible feeling that he might be facing an emissary from his neighbor across the sound. Did he dare make such a messenger wait?

"He gave his name as Geralse Rafan," the secretary explained. "He claims to be a dragonlord of the Twelfth Legion."

Jortan's mouth went wide at this pronouncement, but Sessil continued. "He is dragon-blooded, lord, and bears jade armor and weapons, but he carries no seal or orders, and appears...disheveled."

"Then he is in a hurry," Jortan snapped irritably. "Get the captain to show him in, at once!" He'd not keep a Prince of the Earth waiting in the hall, whatever the Realm had done.

In the moments between his secretary's departure and the arrival of this unexpected guest Jortan found his breath came fast and shallow, even as he shuffled papers and cleared a space, moved a chair from the wall to in front of the desk, and tried to straighten robes wrinkled by the day's work. A dragonlord from the legions? Why? How had he come here, now? The viceroy knew he could not have taken a ship, he would have received word of any such arrivals. How else could a man come to the island? Sorcery?

He took a deep breath, forcing his body under control. Whoever he is, he is a man, not a god, You are the Viceroy, this must be remembered. Whatever he brings, I will not forget that it has been given to me to govern this island, and that the Realm has left us alone for four years.

"My lord Viceroy," Sessil called from the hall. "Dragonlord Geralse Rafan."

Without further ceremony the dragon-blood strode into the modest office.

He certainly looks like a soldier, the works struck against the vacuum of Jortan's mind for a second, as his eyes struggled to encompass, to evaluate, this newcomer.

Rafan was well-built, and tall, though not overly so. He had dark green hair, cut short in a military style, and emerald eyes, contrasting the brighter green of his jade armor. The latter was dusty and grimy, as was the man himself. He is in a true hurry then, the viceroy decided, to present himself so. The dragonlord was like other dragon-blooded the viceroy had met, and yet different. He was poised and powerful, with a commanding presence that was not to be denied, but he did not possess the casual arrogance common to dynasts.

Geralse is no house name, Jortan knew those by heart. He is a found egg then, a career soldier. The man carried the signs of it on his body, an almost visible martial heroism projected from the sturdy, rugged frame. Seeing him the viceroy could only imagine some tableau of ancient battles. 'Drive those Raksha off the ridge,' that was the kind of order you could give this man, and he would see it done. A strange impression in a dragon-blood, and nothing Jortan had seen since Mishaka, if not before.

Jortan stood to meet his guest. "Welcome, dragonlord," he spread his hands and bowed, though only a little. He would claim superior station so long as he dared. "I am Benison Jortan, Viceroy of the Island of Thistles. Will you sit?" He gestured to the chair. "Or take refreshments?" What the kitchens could manage at this hour the viceroy didn't know, but he would not be so rude as to avoid offering.

"Water," Rafan replied. "That will be enough, and I'll stand thanks, hate to ruin your chair." The viceroy found the dragon-blood spoke fine Low Realm, the principle tongue in Thistles, but he was straightforward, not twisting and overtly cultured like so many dynasts, and he bore ever-so-slightly the accents of the south. How long has he been in the field? Jortan questioned.

"You will not mind if I sit then, I trust?" Jortan settled back into his chair. "I'm not as young as I once was, and the hour is late."

Rafan nodded, and the viceroy wondered at the dragonlord's age. It was so very difficult to tell with the dragon-blooded, their long lifespans did not age evenly, or show the same signs. Rafan might be his junior by as much as two decades, or his senior by a full century. It added an extra wrinkle to an already complex social dance. "I am sorry I could not arrange a welcome for you," the viceroy apologized formally, though without heart. "I had no word of your arrival until moments ago."

"I was shipwrecked," the soldier answered, quickly explaining a great many questions away. "I washed ashore at Renburg. I set out from there before dawn yesterday."

"Renburg is in the sixth district," Jortan reasoned aloud, partly to order his thoughts, and partly to display his practical knowledge of his domain. "That is on the western edge of the island, more than one hundred miles distant. You have traveled with great speed sir." It certainly explained the exalt's appearance, but what was the rush? Did he have some critical mission to complete that the shipwreck was ruined?

Visibly drawing in a breath, the dragonlord launched into a brief, transparent explanation. A terrible one. "At approximately midnight on the 5th of Descending Water, the village of Renburg was attacked by roughly one hundred zombies, led by a single nemissary officer. They accessed the territory from a shore-side shadowland, the wards having previously been disabled by the nemissary. I was present in the village and successfully rallied local militia, defeating the attack with minimal losses. I have since made all possible speed to bring you news of the event."

Each sentence slammed into Jortan with the force of many hammers, and he sank deep into his chair. His vision swam, focusing on some place far beyond the man before him. A hero stands as the harbinger of our doom, he thought miserably, struggling to reason at all.

"So," he whispered at last. "It has begun."

"You anticipated this?" the dragon-blood's tone was accusatory.

"It has been almost five years since Thorns fell," the viceroy spoke from beyond his body, in a voice not his own. "The Satrap began packing within days of hearing word. The throne lies empty, and the legions flounder in distant campaigns. It is less than two hundred miles from our eastern shores to Thorns, a city that has been fed by this island's fields ere it was founded. Bathed in shadow, it will need our orchards and pastures lest it starve. Of course he would come, it was merely a matter of time, place, and method."

The soldier before him did not react as the viceroy expected. Instead of sinking down with the weight of it, the cruel inevitability that Thorns' close relation was prey to her former ally's curse, he grew taller at the words, and his face grew hard and firm, trace lines of a bark-like pattern, some ancient oak perhaps, emerged upon his brow. "I believe he has chosen to wage a campaign of terror, if this attack is typical." Rafan fixed Jortan firmly with his gaze, shocking the viceroy to sudden clarity. "I am told you are the ruler now. What will you do?"

Jortan could not bear that stare, so firm it was, and strong. He buried his face in his hands. "I do not know," he all but whimpered. "Our army, such as it was, died at Mishaka, and four years has not been sufficient to build it again. We are forsaken by the Realm, they ask only that we send tribute until the moment of our fall. I would beg for aid from Lookshy, but we have always opposed the Confederation. Submission seems wise, but a dead monster rules Thorns, and besides, what terms could I plead with a deathknight across the table?" Suddenly realizing what he was saying, the viceroy jerked his head up in sudden fear, but he found the exalt before him looked puzzled, not angry.

"How many men do you have?" the dragonlord demanded, not the question the viceroy thought would come.

He knew the figures immediately, had obsessed over them. "If I call in every garrison, Thistles can field five thousand men, well armed, but with little experience. Further, we have no heavy equipment, no war machines or artifact weapons, and not a single one of the dragon-blooded host stands with us."

"And Thorns?"

"I have only the numbers gleaned from merchants, smugglers, and the like," the viceroy wished he had more, but it was hardly important given the disparity. "At least fifty thousand certainly, and with war machines and all the rest we lack in great abundance, plus the deathknights that felled the dynasts of Thorns." He stopped, and then added one last thing. "And there is the Juggernaut."

"If he were to turn that here, you have won," the words were spoken with an absolute certainty Jortan had no way to understand, but his puzzlement was broken by a following question. "This land is more prosperous than any I have seen outside the Blessed Isle. How many are its residents?"

Though he had no real idea why this mattered, the viceroy had those numbers as well. "An exact count is impossible, too many of the inland residents move with the herds, weather, and seasons, but we have used geomancy to enhance the census and arrived at good estimates, if past sorcerous confirmation is to be believed. Presently Thistles holds close to seven hundred and fifty-five thousand residents. Most are citizens, there are some thirty-five thousand slaves."

"Three quarters of a million people," Rafan breathed, then his voice firmed. "That must not fall into the hands of a Deathlord."

"An easy thing to say sir," Jortan countered, four years of isolation had stripped away much of the patience for empty proclamations he had once cultivated. "More difficult to practice. We are outnumbered more than ten to one, and the enemy has every other advantage. I will not lead my people to a pointless slaughter, doubly so," The viceroy did not believe Immaculate promises of the sanctity of Lethe. If the Mask of Winters scourges the island, we will surely serve him in death as well as life, just as the poor souls of Thorns must. "The sheer villainy of the deathlord changes the calculus only so much." Sensing that he had discomforted the soldier, the viceroy added one more simple question. "What would you do, sir, in my place?"

Jortan watched Rafan stand in silence for a moment, clearly thinking on the matter. At length he spoke, quietly and carefully, quoting from distant memory.

"The impossibility of victory does not mean there can be no victory," Jortan knew the puzzlement must have been plain on his face, for the dragonlord continued. "It is not from the Thousand Correct Actions," he managed a grim grin. "A barbarian leader spat it my general's face ten years ago."

"What happened to that barbarian?" Jortan was not certain of the point of this tale.

"He was executed for his insult, under a parlay flag. His tribesmen held to the point of madness for six months after that. Eventually, there was an uprising elsewhere and we marched home." Rafan looked deeply thoughtful. "So he lost everything, but he still won a victory of sorts."

The viceroy understood then. We cannot win, but this soldier believes that if we fight, perhaps we might deliver victory for someone else. Lookshy no doubt, Jortan knew, they were the only suitable candidate. He had no love for Seventh Legion, he'd lost nephews at Mishaka to their power. But the Realm will not act, at least Lookshy will fight. And who knows what fate might bring, perhaps if we stand it could stir the Realm to action. It all sounded very good, but there was one significant problem to adopting such a brutally desperate stance. "You say his tribesmen held for six months. Well and good, but I do not know if we could stand against the Mask of Winters for six hours. That tribal leader sacrificed himself in inspiration. Who could do that here? Not I, certainly, I am no heroic figure." Jortan liked to believe, on better days, that he was a wise ruler who had done right by the island and that history would mark him well, but he knew was merely a man, and unsuited to great things. "Who else is there, the Realm abandoned us, I can call upon no champions, not even one dragon-blooded. Dozens of the puny Hundred Kingdoms could say more."

"You are wrong," Rafan suddenly, voice rising.

"Excuse me?" the viceroy retorted. "The satrap's palace lies empty, it is being colonized by vermin even now. My armies are led by a mortal man, and the Vartabed is a nun twice my age. There are good men and women in this office, but none to challenge even the minions of the Deathlord."

"You are wrong," the dragonlord repeated. "You have one dragon-blooded at your disposal. He stands before you now."

Jortan's mouth fell open. With deliberate effort he shut it again. It took a moment to recognize just what this soldier was offering. It took less time to fail to believe it. "But you are a legionnaire!" He protested. "You have troops and orders, and report only to the Empress, wherever she may be. While I might welcome your help, I cannot steal a man from the legions!"

"You are speaking of a different Geralse Rafan," the soldier said with a wry smile, one tinged with a terrible resignation. "That man was a soldier in the Twelfth Legion, a man of modest record and humble origins. He argued with a political appointee and for his pains was exiled from his unit on a make-work task. Tragically he perished in a grand storm off the coast of Harborhead. The Geralse Rafan who stands before you now in another man, a loyal child of the Realm, just arrived by ship to..." the soldier paused "To..."

"To study with the monks of the Engelburg Monastery in their archery-based martial arts," the Viceroy filled in without pause, gesturing to the bow Rafan carried.

"Yes," the soldier nodded. "However, upon discovering the dreadful depredations of the Deathlord he has offered his services to the Viceroy in this time of crisis."

It was an ill-used story, Jortan thought, and would require embellishment, but to the extent anyone would care it would likely pass muster. If the dragonlord really had been dismissed for some infraction it was unlikely his superiors or the deliberative would inquire too closely. Besides, he thought, the Deathlord will surely be a more immediate problem. He could take the offer, if he wished. Now, it fell to Jortan to decide.

Tonight, upon first hearing that war has come to my shores, I must decide whether or not to fight to the end. Not exactly what I had planned for the evening. The viceroy raised himself up to his full height, less than that of Rafan, but he stared hard into those emerald eyes. "We come to the bare face of it then, dragon-blood." He spoke with deliberate informality, wanting to push the man to language that could not hide. "What are you offering?"

"Give me a commission," the dragonlord ordered. "If you promise to fight, if you promise to force the Deathlord to defeat you, rather than letting him trick you into defeating yourselves, then I will defend this island with all my will and energy until my last breath."

Ever since both emerged from the Contagion Thistles has been the subject of Thorns, not in writ, but in the thoughts of all. Jortan knew well that history. For his first ten years as viceroy he had lived it. To the living that presumption may be granted, his mind was suddenly clear as crystal. Not to the dead. I will bow to a living Empress out of respect, to a Deathlord, only at the point of a sword.

"So be it," Jortan pulled a blank sheet from his stack of papers, and with swift, careful strokes took his brush and wrote a single phrase, sealing it with the red stamp of the Viceroy of Thistles. It read:

Geralse Rafan is now Commanding General of all the Island of Thistles

The viceroy passed the document to the dragon-blood. "We are committed then."

"So we are," Rafan took it and rolled it up carefully, tucking the sheet inside his armor. "But a commitment best begun in the morning, I think. I need to clear my head, and you doubtless need rest by now."

"It will take until then to call a meeting of the particulars in any case," Jortan agreed, glad Rafan displayed some limits to his endurance. "Speak to my secretary, I am certain he has apartments arranged. They will have to be in the interior ministry offices I am sorry to say, the Satrap's palace has not been maintained for ready use." That was not realm protocol, but it was a small pile of dinars Jortan had been able to put to better purposes.

"Fine," the soldier nodded. "I'd rather be closer to business matters anyway."

"Excellent," It was a small gesture, but it well backed the flamboyant one made moments ago. Perhaps I have not rashly doomed us all, the viceroy dared to hope. "Then you are dismissed general, I will see you in the morning."

Rafan put a fist over his heart in salute and left with an abrupt spin.

The viceroy could only sink into his chair as he watched the dragon-blood's rugged form recede from his vision. What have I done? The words crashed through him as waves on the shore, endlessly repeating.

What have I done?

**Chapter Notes**

The number I chose for the population of Thistles was not arrived at without considerable deliberation. I have seen several estimates for medieval Sicily however, and this number serves as in line with those. The numbers Jortan gives for the Mask of Winter's army are taken from CoTD: the Scavenger Lands, but are adjusted for the incomplete intelligence available to the Viceroy.


	6. Chapter 6

**Chapter 6**

**10 Descending Water**

**RY 769**

As ever, the first step within the citadel brought a sudden sensation of stability. Impossible as a matter of logical the black basalt floor was perfectly, totally level and ever unchanging. This could not be so, as that floor, indeed the entirety of the citadel, rested on a pulsing, squirming, tormented mass of flesh dwarfing it in size. At the very least the citadel ought to rock slightly, as a ship upon the ocean.

But it did not.

The woman who walked across those ice-cold stones now did not deny the practicality of a floor that remained in one place despite its generally unstable perch, but she did not especially welcome it either. That unmoving surface was a demonstration of power, specifically of the mighty magic of the one being who truly ruled in this place, and it was a selective power indeed. She fully believed that at any moment the floor might buck and rage tossing every inhabitant save one about as helpless as the toys inside the dollhouse of a spiteful patrician child.

As she was not that one being, she could never shake the sensation of being nothing more than a toy when here. A dark voice in her mind chose that unfortunate moment to hiss in bitter laughter. Perhaps we are all toys then, she reflected from that inspiration.

It brought no solace.

Good, she thought. Safety is an illusion, happiness is a lie, purpose is a falsehood, and all reality is naught but random accidents of mad energies, crashing together, endlessly seeking nothing. Her failure to revel in discomfort was simply a sign of limited enlightenment.

With some regret she turned away from such thoughts of overwhelming entropy and focused back on the task at hand. Practicality must come first, after all. The mask remains until the climax, and that was yet a very long way off indeed.

So she ascended the steps of the winding path to the principle tower of the citadel, forced to climb stair after stair as a monument to little more than vanity, wasting time to no good purpose. The long climb was supposed to impress and awe, and to allow the fear of lesser visitors time to cook into fully risen dread before they reached that tower room. Those were emotions she had long striven to purge from herself, and this walk had only aided her in that regard. So while she did not look forward to this particular destination, the terror of the journey was something she had surpassed.

Her travels were not alone, those steps were wide, and serviced many destinations in the great dark citadel. Any number of lesser forms slid past, most dead, some not, all deferential. The train of her dress shushed slightly upon the stones, and the many thin silver chains adorning wrist, ankles, neck, and delicately wrapped across her bodice and waist suppurated a semi-somber sound of cool depression as she willed them to; her personal theme, deftly suppressed yet still heard. She was a known presence in this dread place, and even among such horrors as wandered its halls it was known that this one in the black-flower lace hood was not to be troubled without cause.

The tower room possessed a door, a massive thing many times the height of a man, wrought with symbols of ancient arcane power. It was not designed as a barrier to interlopers, there were other, less ostentatious measures in place for that, but simply as a display of authority and a curtain of privacy.

It was unnecessary in countless ways, but she knocked even so. He considered it a measure of respect and courtesy, and that was the only criterion that mattered now.

"Enter," a malformed voice whispered from somewhere undefinable within that great door. A dead mind broken to the singular purpose of determining whether the door was to open now or not. It was a display of such arrogance she could not comprehend. It inspired no fear, only puzzlement at the waste.

The door, for all its terrible size and her small frame, opened at the slightest touch, sliding upon soundless hinges forged from the souls of fallen heroes. Some overt symbolism was inevitable in a place such as this. It was also unworthy of notice, considering the means of construction it had all the true significance of paint color, or so she felt, no matter the scale.

The room was not gaudily outfitted at the moment, though that too was illusion, for it could change to suit the will of its master at but a thought. Instead there was simply an empty circle and a great and towering throne of frigid black, light-sucking soulsteel. It was an impeccable piece, a baroque masterwork utterly suited to project the image of the conquering warrior-savant, exactly how its occupant wished to be viewed.

A singular personage occupied that throne now. He was a towering figure, just taller than the tallest man you might ever meet, and wrapped in billowing robes of perfect black, though matching the attire of no nation yet extant in Creation or the Underworld. His face was a false one, a mask, but it was such an impossibly beautiful face no one, not even one such as she, could care for that distortion.

"Master," she dropped to one knee upon entering, and set her hooded face to the dark stones at her feet.

"Widow," his voice had a beauty to match the face, but this lie was more easily falsified, for with every word harsh whispers, unintelligible and below the threshold of hearing in any case, began to echo through the bottom of her mind. It was ever so between them, and she could not know why. She feared that there should even be an answer.

"You have requested an audience," her master spoke, and then suddenly his whole body contorted, the pleasant face replaced with one of demonic fury and unspeakable horror, the wise ruler dissipated into the persona of the murderous tyrant. "Why?" He thundered.

She did not blanch. He thought such parlor tricks useful, and they were, against many, but not only had the Seven Seasons Widow long become inured to his little gags, she had practiced such things herself since her childhood. "There has been a setback master," she did not try to overly minimize, for she could not hide such secrets from him in person, and saw no need to increase his wrath.

"Explain," he demanded, still the voice of terror.

This was a good beginning, for he was prone to rages when faced with setbacks, an emotional tempest not entirely irrational. Of course, it was always partly irrational, for the Widow knew that like all Deathlords the Mask of Winters was quite mad.

She did not particularly care, the universe was naught but a cosmic dice game in any case, only less ordered.

"One of our zombie talons on the Island of Thistles has been lost," she kept her voice steady as she explained, neither performing nor excusing, simply stating things. She believed he appreciated this. "There has been no communication since the lieutenant stated his intent to attack. It has been four days." There was no need to explain the precise meaning of the lapsed time. "I must assume they met some unexpected resistance and were destroyed."

"A pity our lieutenant has not returned," the deathlord grumbled even as his face and form shifted back to perfect pleasantness. "If he has surrendered to either of the calls, simply an unfortunate chance, if he has fled..." he did not bother to explain, and the Widow did not attempt to guess. She had learned, in a fashion most terrible, that her mind could not even come close to imagining the barest fraction of the horrific punishments her master might devise.

"But no matter," the deathlord continued. "One nemissary is irrelevant, as are a hundred zombies, ultimately. Unexpected resistance was always a possibility, and it may even be a boon to encounter it so early."

"How so my master?" she rarely questioned, but when it came to military matters he had demanded she expend the effort to learn, so inquiries were tolerated, at least to a point.

"Recalcitrant elements shall always rear their heads in any enterprise," that perfect voice took on the manner of a chiding father. It was the phrasing she hated more than any other from his mouth. Master she accepted, parent, she did not. "Early identification allows for prompt elimination." He focused his eyes upon her. "This you shall do. Find whatever agency was responsible and destroy it. I shall leave you to your own devices regarding the appropriate manner of such a demise, but it is to be done with all haste. Additionally, you are to accelerate your campaign with all due haste, you must not let survivors spread words of hope and defiance."

"Of course not," she agreed, understanding this point perfectly. It was her campaign, after all, though he had provided considerable 'advice' to the plans. "Have I your leave to journey to the island in person then?"

"Yes," the deathlord allowed, removing one barrier the Widow had long desired destroyed. "But you are not to reveal yourself. That time has not yet come."

"As you command, my master," she accepted this with as much grace as she possessed. It was reasonable, and so far he had presented no punishment. She hoped to leave accordingly. This problem ought to be easy to solve.

"Go then," The Mask of Winters commanded. "I leave this in your hands for now, Widow," he intoned. "Prove your competence against further problems, or be prepared for subsequent tasks suited to one of," there was a pause pregnant with one thousand hideous eventualities. "Lesser talents."

"I hear and obey," She did not want to consider what those words portended, though one possibility immediately suggested itself. The Physician desired her, in more ways than one, but she would see him perform his experiments on his own flesh, rather than hers.

It was a clear dismissal, and the widow scuttled out from the room. It was a motion lacking in grace, but one did not turn their back to a deathlord. Ever.

Emerging into the hall she allowed a single steadying breath, not out of fear, never that, but simply to take in the suddenly less oppressive air. The proximity to such a nexus of power as her master was a draining experience.

In the next moment she discovered she was not alone in the passage.

Not that she was ever precisely alone here, where terrified ghosts swarmed steadily on various business, but she was in the presence of something more than those insignificant entities; an unexpected and unwelcome development.

"Oh, so you're the reason I had to wait then, Seven," a coy voice giggled from her side.

The Widow declined to look at the speaker. No one, not even the Mask of Winters, referred to her as Seven. Only this insolent whelp dared. Fool miserable sadist, the Widow felt nothing but contempt for her erstwhile rival. A rabid dog on a leash you are and nothing more.

The Widow walked past the murderous child known as the Maiden of Mirthless Smile without so much as a wave of an eyelash, casually ducking under the daiklave that swung in her face as a challenge. Imbecile, she thought. Even in a universe without purpose there are still some things known. Among those was the bare reality that the master of them both would destroy utterly any Deathknight who struck at another within his citadel. The Maiden's bravado was pointless, and born of no reasonable source. It was well known that the brutal girl-killer hated the Widow simply because she felt their names placed one above the other.

Such matters are madness itself, the Widow thought as always, but today added a sly smile. Perhaps, after I complete this mission that you, for all your potency in the martial arena, never could, I shall ask for your leash as my reward. Yes, she decided. She would enjoy that very much.

It was nice to have a motive.

Her task being imperative, she wasted no time in leaving the citadel, walking swiftly through the horrific remains of juggernaught, unseemly in its eternal death throes even to one such as she, before standing upon the wasted grounds of the once fine fields outside the city of Thorns again. Not far from the fallen behemoth waited her small retinue of immediate pawns. Not that they thought of themselves as such, but the Widow knew them in true fashion.

All relationships eventually die, what use bonds not utilitarian in purpose?

"Mistress, we welcome your return," Sereni, the Widow's ghost-blooded maid, was the first to greet her. "Did the meeting go well?" The child-like half-dead woman wisely did not ask for details.

"It went," the Widow replied. Sereni was useful, mostly, and more than a maid besides, but for all her helpful talents it would not do to let her get too close. "Plans have changed, we make for the Field of Fallen Blades with all due haste." she stepped up into the black coach that was kept waiting, nodding to her driver. The ghost-blood hopped aboard only a moment before the team whipped into motion. "Summon Returning Burn Sereni," the Widow instructed. "I must relay commands."

The maid had the advantage of being a modest necromancer, not powerful enough to be a threat, but providing her mistress with the resource of a few spells. As a result she was a valuable tool of coordination and travel.

Of course it was not possible to summon up a ghost with sorcerous power while riding in the back of a carriage, but even the aborted attempt was sufficient to make it known to Returning Burn his superior desired his presence. The nemissary had tricks of his own to cover distance swiftly, and it took no more than an hour's journey for him to appear.

The Widow did not in practice travel with dead companions, but Sereni was part of the way there, and so it was possible for the nemissary to easily control her body when needed. Regrettably the maid would not remember anything said, which meant the deathknight was forced to take notes at times, an irritant, but the benefits outweighed the costs.

The maid's eyes rolled back into her head as the ghostly rider swarmed over her weakened grave-tainted soul, and she began to speak in a voice far from her own past blue lips.

"You called mistress?" the nemissary questioned when he arrived, slightly challenging. They were not fond of each other. She could not like nemissaries, useful as they were. Jumping from body to body like that, it defies that natural order of things. They should not be able to endure so. Returning Burn's reasons were far less cerebral. He hated the Widow because she had supplanted him, nothing more or less.

"I am departing to the Field of Fallen Blades," she explained imperiously. "We are accelerating our plans. You must move troops into position accordingly. I shall be taking personal command on Thistles, there is a small matter to resolve there."

"As you command mistress," the nemissary acknowledged. "But such a large movement will violate the terms negotiated with the Endlessly Virtuous Host," he snickered at the name, and even the Widow could not help but laugh at its ridiculousness.

She had to admit this point. "I will renegotiate," she decided. Those fools would not dare their recalcitrance against her in person. "Move the troops."

The nemissary made a messy grin of Sereni's delicate porcelain features. "By your leave," he enjoyed destruction. Too much, the Widow thought. It was a common failing of the dead, savoring bloodlust for the mere sensation of the killing. "Have you other instructions?"

"Yes," The Widow did indeed have an idea he could implement. "Acquire some suitable bait for the monsters of the Sea of Shadows. The coastal shadowlands may be too small for anything practical, but a symbolic measure could be equally effective."

"It may be difficult to find good candidates in Thorns mistress," her lieutenant cautioned, expressing a problem that had been growing for some time.

"Purchase them from the Guild then," the Widow decided. "We might as well waste coin rather than energy."

"As you command."

"Go then," she dismissed the miserable ghost. He made a competent assistant, but she did not desire him gaining ideas of his own importance. He must believe she had not destroyed him when she took his place because it amused her, not because his skills remained necessary.

It took Sereni a short while to recover from possession, long enough for the small party to arrive at the shore. The still, black waves of the Sea of shadows extended out from Thorns now, night had fallen. "Summon the vessel." The Widow commanded.

So the ghost-blood sang, and her dirge brought forth a bone-hulled ship with sails of human skin. A small device, truly not more than a dinghy, but swift, serviceable, and warded against the dangers of that black water.

The Widow followed Sereni aboard, bringing only her coachman, a nondescript man of many modest talents, and a scribe, a mute youth who had been trained to perfectly take her dictation. All were mortal, she had found the advantages of ghostly servants did not outweigh the drawback of properly functioning in only one of two essential realities. Mortal men had greater flexibility.

The ship sailed at the necromancer's will, and they set out for Thistles. The Widow felt a twinge of anticipation at the black shadows of the island's high peaks in the far distance over the empty underworld air. I am done playing games with petty horse thieves, she thought with relish. My master reaches out his hand to claim another realm. It is not Thorns, she acknowledged. But it will be mine to claim. That any adulation her name might receive would be ultimately meaningless did not mean it would not be sweet.

**Chapter Notes**

So, canon characters, yes... Obviously the Mask of Winters is a canon character, and he's a bit tricky to handle, being dead, insane, and of nigh-unfathomable power and intellect, so we take the dance lightly. Seven Seasons Widow is also, technically, a canon character. She is mentioned in CoTD: the Scavenger Lands as one of the Mask of Winter's deathknights. That is the extent of her canon representation, so aside from the name I'm creating her more or less whole cloth. The Maiden of the Mirthless Smile (she of brief cameo appearance for the moment), is also a canon character and one considerably more developed. Her little rivalry with the Widow is my own invention, but it seems appropriate for someone of her level of sociopath.

A few of the tricks involving Sereni and Returning Burn are predicated on ghost-blooded mutations. The spell used is canonical.


End file.
